


livin' at a pace that kills

by eat_crow



Category: Merlin (TV)
Genre: Car Accidents, Hospitals, M/M, Motorcycles, Nurse Merlin (Merlin), Street Racing
Language: English
Status: Completed
Published: 2021-03-02
Updated: 2021-03-02
Packaged: 2021-03-15 14:28:41
Rating: Teen And Up Audiences
Warnings: Graphic Depictions Of Violence
Chapters: 1
Words: 1,857
Publisher: archiveofourown.org
Story URL: https://archiveofourown.org/works/29809815
Author URL: https://archiveofourown.org/users/eat_crow/pseuds/eat_crow
Summary: You could say Arthur is a bit of a daredevil.A broken arm, a fractured collar bone, road burn on his thigh and hip, and a body covered in bruises and filled with aches. But his head is fine, and his back is fine, and with all luck he could be back to work by the end of the week, and if his bike weren't demolished he could be on that too. Against doctor's orders, but he could, in theory.
Relationships: Merlin/Arthur Pendragon (Merlin)
Comments: 22
Kudos: 124
Collections: Merlin Bingo





	livin' at a pace that kills

**Author's Note:**

> this was supposed to be a street racing drabble, but i decided to make it a bingo fill instead for my bingo square **i5: broken bones**. then i added in some merthur fluff just because.

When Gwaine first flags him down and gestures to the open road, motioning a hard throttle, the last thing Arthur thinks is going to happen is a crash. It's the middle of the night, the roads are empty, what harm could a little race do?

So they slow at the next light, Arthur on his custom Ducati with an obscene amount of cc, and Gwaine on his lime green frankenstein of a bike that serves as an ongoing mechanical project for his boyfriend Elyan and somehow manages to best Arthur on its good days.

"Finish line?" Arthur asks over the rumble of their engines, his visor up.

"46th and 9th," Gwaine calls back. Five blocks, some turns. Nothing they haven't done before.

"On green," he says, and flicks his visor back down over his eyes.

With their fingers wrapped firmly around the brake they gun their engines, both men obnoxiously competitive and tugging on their throttle to get their engines hot and their tires spinning before the starting light. Smoke rises, rubber grinds into the asphalt. Gwaine's jacked out speakers blast _runnin' with the devil_.

The second the street light turns green, they release the brake and shoot forward. Gwaine takes the lead, never quite as concerned about wearing out his tires as Arthur is. But it isn't a setback, not for Arthur, because he squeezes his chest to the body of his bike, the vibration numbing his ribcage, and pulls the throttle as far back as it'll go. He laughs, coarse and unfair, and Gwaine makes an obscene gesture at him as he passes and weaves ahead of him into his own lane just to be a prick.

His right peg scrapes the ground as he tilts into a hard turn. Gwaine curses and pumps his brakes to keep from hitting him.

Arthur slows as he nears a red light on the next block.

Gwaine blitzes straight past him.

"Fuck!" Arthur laughs, watching Gwaine run the light.

And why shouldn't he? There isn't anyone around.

Arthur manages to catch up again, cutting in front of Gwaine to slow him down, and he risks a look over his shoulder to gloat. He's nearing another red light when he turns back.

This time, he doesn't slow.

This time, there's a pick up truck barreling clear through the intersection.

Arthur's small intestine leaps into his mouth, and his throat shoots down to his knees. He slams the brakes, gripping hard with his hand and pushing even harder with his foot. He doesn't have time to stop himself from jerking to the side. There's a screech that surrounds him, that pierces his skull.

Arthur's body reacts before he does. The handlebars twist. The motorcycle goes down. In a reflex, he pushes away and lets go. All he sees is his gloved hands, his feet kicking up like a ragdoll, the orange bathed sidewalk and the navy blue sky spinning around each other, and then he's on the ground.

His chest clenches tight, and he struggles to let it pass and not fight against it. His arm is throbbing. His hip is on fire. A car door opens and shuts. A skidding noise, the smell of burning rubber, and a scraping crash.

"Arthur? _Arthur!_ " Gwaine cries, ripping his own helmet off and running at him. He drops to his knees at Arthur's head. "Mate, talk to me," he pleads, easing Arthur's own helmet off. Arthur groans and wipes his glove over his sweaty forehead.

"How fucked is my bike?" Are his first words. Gwaine lets out a relieved, watery sigh, dropping his head into his hands and dipping down to Arthur's chest.

"Oh, fucksake, you're fine," he breathes. "Bike's, uh," he looks up and at the intersection, then winces, "bike's fucked like a pornstar in a gangbang, man."

"Don't say that shit to me," Arthur says with a deep frown.

"Two more seconds and that would've been you," Gwaine says, still looking in the direction of the intersection.

"--needs an ambulance," Arthur hears from afar. "I don't know, he just came out of nowhere, I-- the intersection on 43rd and 9th. Um, south-- 43rd southwest, yeah. I don't _know,_ I don't--" a deep breath-- "yeah, okay, okay, I'm sorry. Okay. Please just, just get here. Thank you."

"My dad's gonna have a fucking cow," Arthur complains, shifting his hips because his chewed up leg is pressing into the road and it fucking hurts.

"That's what you're worried-- christ, I'm gonna kill that wrinkled prick," Gwaine mutters.

Gwaine doesn't let him move until the ambulance comes, telling him over and over about how he could break his back by moving too much and that he saw it on the Discovery channel or something. He keeps him still with his hands on his shoulders. Arthur tells him that if he doesn't get his hands off him he'll break his wrists, which usually works, and the fact that it doesn't only succeeds in worrying him.

The man with the truck is named Percival. He was driving home after babysitting his niece. He still has the smudged, glittery nail polish on his fingers from his visit. He's incredibly apologetic.

"I swear to god I'm fine," Arthur says, more annoyed than anything because his entire body aches and he wants to go home and take a nap.

"You're in shock," the EMT tells him, a guy with a name plate reading _du Lac_ . "You're not going to feel any pain until you, y'know, _feel_ your pain. You could have a shattered leg and not know it."

"I think I'd fucking know it," Arthur says. He sighs as du Lac and his partner load him onto a stretcher.

"Where are we going?" Gwaine asks, one foot into the back of the truck.

"We're not letting anyone in the ambulances anymore, man, sorry," du Lac tells him. "Covid regulations and all." Gwaine pales.

"But I'm-- he--"

"We're going to Caerleon Regional Hospital. You know it?"

"Been a million times," Gwaine says. "But you don't understand, I'm--"

"If you're family, just give your ID and relation to the victim and you'll be permitted in, per his allowance."

"He doesn't _have_ any family," Gwaine says desperately. "I mean, he's got a dad, and a sister, but they're a lot of cunts--"

"Sir," du Lac says, holding an arm out to keep Gwaine at a respectable distance, "my main concern right now is getting him to the hospital. Follow or don't, but you're not coming in the ambulance."

"Gwaine, go home," Arthur says. "Tell everyone not to freak out." _Everyone_ is really only Elyan and Leon, but given that they're Arthur's emergency contacts one and two they're going to find out sooner rather than later, and better to hear it from Gwaine.

"I'll come back for you," he promises.

"Don't be so dramatic."

  
  


The next thing Arthur knows, he's inside of the ambulance, and du Lac is working silently as he prepares a saline drip and a dose of morphine.

"Can you rate your pain from one to ten?" du Lac asks. Arthur moans. His joints are starting to take on that swollen, overstuffed sausage ache. He can't take his mind off the radiating and exposed heat of his leg. His left forearm has a sharp, bone deep throb that won't leave him alone.

"I don't know," Arthur says, and squeezes his eyes closed. "I'm trying not to be dramatic, here."

"Just be honest," he says.

"Six and climbing," he admits. Du Lac hums. He twists a syringe into the port on his IV. He steadily pushes down the plunger. Then, he untwists the syringe and replaces it with a new one. He pushes the plunger down in one go. He shivers when cold fluid runs up his arm.

"How about now?" He asks, as an invisible bag of bricks drops over Arthur's entire body.

"Oh. Yep," is the only thing he can say. 

  
  


A broken arm, a fractured collar bone, road burn on his thigh and hip, and a body covered in bruises and filled with aches. But his head is fine, and his back is fine, and with all luck he could be back to work by the end of the week, and if his bike weren't demolished he could be on that too. Against doctor's orders, but he _could_ , in theory.

"Hey there, Evil Knievel," a nurse greets him, knocking on the door frame, and Arthur can't hold back his dopey smile.

" _Merlin_ ," he coos, sinking into his pillows. It feels normal when he says it, but Merlin laughs pitifully into his hand.

"How much morphine did they give you?" He asks.

"Just…" he elongates the word as he stretches his arms out, one wrapped in rock hard plaster, "enough."

"Too much, I'd say," he answers. He looks over his shoulder, then steps into the room and closes the door. He reaches into his pockets and retrieves two cups of pre-sealed green jell-o. "I brought a gift," he sings, shaking the cups.

"And here I thought you were just happy to see me," Arthur says. 

"I," Merlin pulls up a chair, "am always happy to see you." He hands one of the cups off to Arthur before he kicks his legs up on the bed and starts screwing with the TV. When he settles on some garbage reality show, he yanks off his mask and takes an exaggerated breath. 

"That's not allowed," Arthur teases, struggling to open his jell-o cup. For some reason, his hands just lack the proper coordination and strength. Merlin snatches the cup from his hands.

"I won't tell if you won't," he says. He peels back the tin seal and returns it. Arthur crushes the plastic cup to slurp the gelatin from the top. "So what was it this time? Driving on one wheel in a crowded street? Wrap yourself around a telephone pole? No, no, I know: you got distracted by your own reflection in your side mirror."

"I ran a red," Arthur says, around his jell-o. Merlin tuts.

"Rookie mistake."

"Well, how else am I supposed to see you?" Arthur asks.

"I'm on tinder," Merlin suggests, scooping a mouthful of gelatin out of the cup with his tongue. Arthur barks a laugh. His head settles heavy on the pillows.

"No phone number, then?" Merlin presses his lips together and shakes his head.

"No way, the government can track you with that. I prefer Facebook."

"Just you and all the other eighty year old men, yeah?" 

"Exactly how I like it." Merlin checks his watch and clicks his tongue against the roof of his mouth. He tips the cup back and taps the bottom, then tosses it into the beige trash can in the corner of the room. He takes an off brand permanent marker from his breast pocket, removes the cap with his teeth, and gently takes Arthur's cast in hand. "This," he says, voice warped from the cap, "is so that you don't keep hurting yourself just to come see me."

Arthur watches as he writes.

_(406) 110 - 1225_

Then he scribbles his name, _Merlin_ , with a heart over the _i_.

**Author's Note:**

> "there are two kinds of motorcyclists. ones who've fallen off their bikes, and ones who are going to." - the instructor that proctored my license test
> 
> i'll probably fuck around with more street racing/motorcyclist aus, with a little less gore. i do love me some crazy driving
> 
> catch me on tumblr @ [sterlingdylan](https://sterlingdylan.tumblr.com/)


End file.
